Conventionally, there has been known an image processing apparatus (printing apparatus) provided with an inspection unit for inspecting a result of image printing performed by the printing unit. The inspection unit includes an image reading unit for acquiring an image printed on a sheet being conveyed along a conveyance path as inspection image data.
Then, the inspection unit determines whether the print result is good or bad (existence or absence of a print failure) based on the inspection image data acquired by the image reading unit. This arrangement enables a print result to be automatically determined, and thereby enables a corrective action such as reprinting to be automatically performed if the print result indicates a print failure. As a result, the reliability of the image processing apparatus can be further improved.
Whether a print result is good or bad is determined based on the inspection image data, as mentioned above. Therefore, the inspection accuracy of a print result is largely affected by the quality of inspection image data. Accordingly, high-quality inspection image data should be acquired to realize inspection of the print result with higher accuracy.
One possible measure for acquiring high-quality inspection image data is to control a sheet conveyance speed. There is PTL1 as a conventional art addressing it. PTL1 discusses a technique of detecting a sheet conveyance speed to set scanning timing according to the detected conveyance speed.